I only have one foot on the ground (that's the definition of this blog, Rabbi Hillel meets the luftmensch and goes for a ride) but I can't think of a more hopeful piece to read tonight than rbguy's wonderful reporting from Congress for Daily Kos on Keith Ellison of Minnesota, Brian Baird of Washington, and Donna Edwards of Maryland standing up for justice in Palestine, and holding hearings and "community conversations."
There have always been congresspeople who stood up for Palestinians. Jim Moran, Cynthia McKinney, Nick Rahall, Dennis Kucinich, Senator Jim Abourezk, and so on. But something feels different about this troika. They span the country, they are diverse, , they are young, or in Baird's case next-generation. You can say that Ellison was called to it by being Muslim, or that he and Donna Edwards are in the black Andrew-Young tradition of supporting the Palestinians, or that Baird is an outlander; but this feels post-Israel lobby to me. Donna Edwards is from the heart of the beast, Silver Spring, MD, and she's made a connection with Dan Levy who's been a J Street supporter. Baird is a clinical psychologist, an intellectual. Ellison represents the western suburbs of Minneapolis, including St. Louis Park, where Tom Friedman started his work celebrating the Six-Day-War back in high school.
All three are empowered by us, the Iraq war opposition, to apply those lessons to Palestine. "Through their words, and their actions, these three Representatives
are challenging the traditional American-Middle East establishment," says rbguy.
It gives me hope in the movement I'm part of. We need a new "combination," as Lincoln would say. Lincoln was an outsider in the House who served only one term and came to national infamy by opposing the Mexican American war in 1848, because it wasn't our war, and because the president had lied about his reasons for beginning hostilities. In the years that followed, Lincoln left D.C. and built an outsider political movement against slavery, and broke up the old parties. He was able to do so because of the incredible gathering storm of an issue. The mainstream politicians, having cut a deal on slavery, again and again cried out: Why the agitation? The agitation was there, Lincoln said, because the policy was morally wrong, and it must have a political voice.
Lincoln was an ambitious man. That's a famous quality in him. "His ambition was a little engine that knew no rest." And I suppose that's what I love about these three. They all feel like ambitious politicians. For once, there is a sense that political ambition might be wed in our country with support for an evenhanded policy in the Middle East. Now that's news.
